Path: utzoo!attcan!uunet!decwrl!hayes.ims.alaska.edu!accuvax.nwu.edu!nucsrl!telecom-request From: JAJZ801@calstate.bitnet Newsgroups: comp.dcom.telecom Subject: Re: Response to International Calling Redlining Message-ID: <13904@accuvax.nwu.edu> Date: 21 Oct 90 08:00:24 GMT Sender: news@accuvax.nwu.edu Organization: TELECOM Digest Lines: 100 Approved: Telecom@eecs.nwu.edu X-Submissions-To: telecom@eecs.nwu.edu X-Administrivia-To: telecom-request@eecs.nwu.edu X-Telecom-Digest: Volume 10, Issue 754, Message 8 of 8 Gee, and I naively thought this thread had died a merciful death, but I guess you gotta allow for slow readers and PAT's propensity to continue publishing responses that take his side even when he cuts off ones that don't (like my last response to his last comment). PAT inserted his point of view sarcasticly in a recent issue (748?) which I won't waste the effort on responding to. MODERATION has its privileges I guess in which moderation is not an obligation. Actually, I'm willing to live with that given all the work this obviously takes; only a fanatic would do it in the first place. As I have acknowledged consistently, I'm not a lawyer (one of MY few virtues) nor a telecom expert like many readers, so the things I postulate may not be supported in statute or tariff, but I think I can support their logic and good sense with anybody. > Mr. Sicherman, you overlook one difference between the telephone and > email: if you are bombarded with incoming telephone calls, you cannot > use your phone for outgoing calls, nor can you receive desired > incoming calls, so indeed you have been deprived of a service you are > paying for. I think you are taking a very narrow view of things. First, the email has to get through to the receipient so there is a bandwidth consumption through nodes, networks and accounts, the nature and extent of which may vary from system to system and with the actual amount of mail. Second, the effect of this load on the recipient's email service may also vary from implementation to implementation and in some indeterminable portion of cases indeed interfere with his use of the service. We haven't even addressed the effect upon the providor (MCIMAIL, etc.) and whther they have a case and a cause for interference with normal operations. > But if you are bombarded with email, your outgoing email can still get > out and your desired incoming email (at least on a large commercial > system like MCI Mail or AT&T Mail, where storage space is not a > factor) still reaches you. You may be exasperated, annoyed, angered, > or incensed, but you have not been deprived of email service. I seriously doubt that any tribunal would decide on the (il)legality or liability based upon the size of the recipients disk space. If anything, this would impact amount of damages. This would call for rather detailed foreknowledge by the perpetrators and I don't think has anything to do with the central issue: which is whether a group of individuals 'conspired' to send large volumes of email traffic with the intent to harass the recipient. I do not know how a judge would rule or jury would decide on this; I just think that if the medium is not a public forum (so freedom of speech is not an issue) and if the volume is the message, there is an argument for harassment and a case for conspiracy among the contributors. > If you wish to bombard me, kindly do it on GEnie or MCI Mail; at my > accounts on local pubnet sites, storage limitation *is* a factor. Seems to me this supports my argument: you want to restrict the freedom of others to communicate with you on a volume-dependent basis; why shouldn't other others have the same right ? ---------------- [Moderator's Note: Thanks for letting me know I am a fanatic. I'm sure David Tamkin appreciates your comments about him being a slow reader also. Not everyone can devote their entire day to reading TELECOM Digest, Mr. Sicherman. One reader on MCI Mail said he is currently about thirty issues behind. Will you graciously pardon us if in a few days he gets around to your message and decides to respond to it? And if you don't mind, we prefer not to have meta-conversations here, as per your 'gee, I thought this thread had died a merciful death ...' . If you do not wish to continue discussing something, Mr. Sicherman, then *don't discuss it*. One of the wonderful things about net news is that you can skip over the messages you do not want to read. Contrary to your assertion that because I did not agree with your message I would not print it, you will note that indeed, your messages do get published here, like lots of others. Or did you mean that your messages were not printed here as a priority item, Mr. Sicherman? Was that it? Yours were to be moved to the top of the stack? Although by net custom, my title here is Moderator, I more view my role as facilitator and editor. I am admittedly, a telecom activist. I encourage people to do things which in their estimation will make a difference for the better. Your arguments against the use of email as a way of informing, educating and persuading people are invalid. The dire consequences of which you and others have spoken are unrealistic. You freely admit to not being a solicitor. Why don't we leave it at that? No one here is encouraging anyone to 'flood' or 'disrupt' the email service of any site. Define those words as you wish, Mr. Sicherman. It does not matter, really. Dozens of copies of this Digest go daily to MCI Mail and AT&T Mail. Your message will be included in the current mailing. I guess I am already causing a flood of mail, considering I get over a hundred letters daily and try to print at least 25-40 of them. The amount of text transmitted as news on any given day greatly exceeds the amount of email between sites. Would you stop that also? Some of it is pretty vindictive toward the same companies we talk about here. Better still, perhaps you and Mr. Stanley could start a mailing list and say all the Correct Things To Be Said each day, and route your messages to the Correct Departments and the Correct People. PAT]